


Never Knew it Could Be This

by kriari (kadielkrieger)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV) RPF
Genre: First Time, Hobrien, M/M, Morning Sex, Oblivious, Pretending to be Asleep, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-22
Updated: 2012-08-22
Packaged: 2017-11-12 16:02:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/493076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kadielkrieger/pseuds/kriari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dylan repays Tyler's kindness. Just not in any way he expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Knew it Could Be This

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to dizzzylu and blue_fjords for audiencing this madness and beating it into shape with their badass beta skills. No real people were harmed in the writing of this fic.
> 
> _I have been known to[tumbl](http://kriari.tumblr.com) on occasion._

The coffee table breaks his fall.

As performances go, it’s not his best work. If Russell was here, he'd call cut and pull that little hand thing he sometimes does when Dylan has pushed his beat, tipped the comedic scales from broad right on over into slapstick. It’s a gift, being a natural goob. Makes Stiles easy skin to inhabit. For all the praise they force feed him, it took everybody about two minutes to realize it’s him behind the spastic, not a choice. Dylan likes to think he’s smoother than Stiles, even when his brain-to-mouth filter breaks down or he’s so hopped up on coffee and Dew he can’t completely control his limbs anymore. But when he turns it up to eleven for the camera, he knows all that clumsy, flailing idiocy comes from a deep place. Like, his bones or something. Genetic. Dylan O’Brien. Professional goob. 

So, instead of waking up like any normal red-blooded dude in his twenties with a hard-on and a banshee wail from his bladder, Dylan full on body slams Hoechlin’s coffee table. His nose catches on the corner, a sharp sting that, thankfully, doesn’t end in bloodshed. Half a second later he kisses the floor that also, unsurprisingly, belongs to Hoechlin, his shoulder bearing the brunt like his body has finally learned how to protect itself. Aside from the way his foot tangles in the blanket still tucked down between couch cushions, Gary would call it a clean fall. No damage done. None other than what little remains of his dignity and since there’s no one around to witness his complete lack of cool, Dylan feels good floating himself a freebie. He was asleep, after all, and can’t be held accountable for his actions. 

It takes time to work himself free, because the damn blanket has a death grip on his ankle and there’s not much real estate between the old second-hand sofa and the table. Besides trying not to add a dent in his forehead to the dent in his nose, Dylan spends most of it wondering what the hell possessed Linden to buy the thing in the first place, followed closely by wondering what the hell made Tyler think the eyesore was destined to live at the beach house. Then he remembers Linden is an actual grown-up with actual non-fictional offspring, and at some point being able to hide Kool-Aid stains was more important than aesthetics, and that Tyler, for all the success, old and new, is like, weirdly frugal in very specific ways. 

So it makes sense, mostly. Though he still can’t figure out the wherefore of waking up on Hoechlin’s hand-me-down couch at six in the morning on a Sunday. Except, the last thing he honestly remembers is Colton elbowing Posey out of his rotation on the PS3 and the sweet coconut-mango scent of Holland’s shampoo when she said his name and a phrase that, at the time, sounded suspiciously like “were-cocoon” but was probably “spare bedroom.” 

His body, for good or bad, insists he’s still living on Eastern Daylight. While it gets easier to make the jump each time he does it, Dylan’s jet lag lingers longer than he’d like, turning him into grandma for a full two weeks after he hits the coast again. Give him a pair of knitting needles and a gift card to Hometown Buffet, and he’d be golden. As in Golden Girls.

It’ll pass, always does. And then he’ll be back to drawing handlebar mustaches on Posey with Crystal’s eyeliner when he’s the first to run out of steam. Honestly, as often as Dylan screws with sleeping people, when he finally gets himself up and into the bathroom, his reflection surprises him. Beyond the cross-hatch pattern the upholstery left on his cheek and the customary flat-spikey-flat state of his hair, he just looks like he slept hard. Which can only mean there are pictures he’ll have to live down. Somewhere. Probably on Posey’s phone.

Since he didn’t actually plan on exploring a sleepover relationship with Hoechlin’s ugly fucking couch, he’s down a toothbrush and a change of clothes. His finger works for one, the zing of Tyler’s cinnamon toothpaste hitting the back of his tongue. The swim trunks he brought for the beach but never got to use manage the other. 

Slipping into them makes Dylan’s skin itch with wanting to be in the ocean after being landlocked for so long, but he knows better than to go down by himself. Capable gets you exactly nowhere when it comes to undertow and there aren’t any guards on duty until at least seven. 

Instead, he tracks down Hoechlin’s coffee-maker, shoved in a box labeled KITCHEN in the bottom of his pantry. Somehow, Tyler has survived a week without it, but Dylan doesn’t want to think about how. There are Kona beans in the freezer, stacked in the neat little air-tight bricks that appear, magically, wherever Tyler goes, and Dylan has been working on how to turn that into a Jack and the Beanstalk joke since it happened the first time. He hasn’t figured out how to make it funny. Yet. The bean thing is a problem. For Tyler, of course, because it’s not healthy to keep a pound of coffee beans in your glove compartment like it’s a caffeinated flare gun, emergency use only. In this case, it’s also a problem for Dylan. Because, coffee. Coffee grinders make a shit ton of noise. 

Sometimes, he thanks all his lucky stars Hoechlin believes in keeping his stuff organized, because the grinder is actually in the same box as the coffee maker. And maybe it isn’t entirely necessary to take it into the little cubbyhole that passes for an office to spin it up, but, good-natured screwing around aside, Dylan respects the sanctity of sleep. They get so little shuteye when they’re working, they’re all duty-bound to catch up whenever they can. There are limits to his altruism though, and coffee is a well-known _line_.

Dylan creeps back to the kitchen, bare feet and creaking boards, and dumps the grounds into a filter. Eyeballing the water level for that optimum brew strength between Hoechlin’s it-could-cause-you-bodily-harm and Dylan’s own, slightly more sane, definition of coffee takes skill, but he’d perfected the balance way back when they were three little peas in an Atlanta apartment pod. It’s hard to forget. Neither Tyler really does verbal communication pre-caffeine, which, of course, meant Dylan was obligated to fill the space between grunts. After a week spent getting pelted with dirty socks and crumpled takeout menus, he’d started setting his alarm ten minutes early to make sure there was coffee ready.

If he’s lucky, the smell alone will wake Hoechlin up. No way to tell by looking whether anyone else crashed here. As a rule, beach houses collect cast-offs like driftwood. Shoes and shirts and sunglasses mostly, but there was an extra wetsuit in the hall closet when Dylan hung up his jacket last night that has to belong to Linden. And as pretty as Tyler is, Dylan’s never known him to need hair clips to tame his mane, especially not now that he’s buzzed down. They probably belong to Holland. Coffee will definitely wake her up if she’s here. Or bacon. Maybe Ty has bacon. He should make pancakes. Or omelets. 

And, damn, it’s not like Dylan’s unable to entertain himself. Hello, YouTube? It’s just a lot more fun to entertain Hoechlin. Dude smiles with his whole face and shakes when he laughs like he might explode if you let him go long enough. Dylan has always enjoyed having an audience, he’s just built that way, and it doesn’t hurt that no matter what comes out of his mouth, Tyler finds it hilarious. As if his ego needed any more stroking.

Dylan chews on his lip and watches the coffee pot burble through the brew cycle instead of examining himself or his motives too closely. The real reasons he wants to wake Hoechlin up are more complicated. He decides to play it safe, to hunt for a mug because doing so doesn’t make him ask questions he’s pretty keen on never answering. Ever. 

Should be strange, he thinks, going through Tyler’s cabinets, but they’ve never been great at boundaries. His glassware is exactly where glassware should be though, to the right of the sink, over the dishwasher and it’s not as distracting an expedition as Dylan would like it to be. Snooping is a strong word; one Dylan has zero interest in applying to his actions. So he tells himself he’s just getting up close and personal with the kitchen layout when he opens all the other cabinets, all the other drawers, searching where no mug would ever live. You know, just in case he changes his mind about those pancakes. 

Tyler has only halfway unpacked, but the kitchen is a mirror image of the place in Atlanta. The knowledge twists a knot in Dylan’s gut. Only wisdom and experience keep him from tugging at the snarl. Hoechlin does shit like this all the time. He’s the great wheel-greaser, the guy who quietly makes life easier for everyone in his bubble without asking for acknowledgement or gratitude or anything in return. And yeah, it’s not like he’s funding safe water wells in Uganda or curing cancer, but he took the time to set up his kitchen for _them_. All of them. Because while it had technically been just Dylan, Tyler, and Tyler cohabitating, their apartment had also been a second home for pretty much the entire cast. 

Dylan pours his coffee and tries, desperately, not to get sucked into sentiment, but Hoechlin is a black hole of good will and it’s impossible to resist the pull. Reciprocation should be a rule, and were Dylan a better kind of man, it would have bothered him before now. But he cares, really wants to avoid becoming that selfish little shit he could totally be. A lot.

That’s how he ends up stretched out on a lounge chair on the back patio, watching the sun kiss the whitecaps orange and pink, ever so slowly draining his mug and trying to figure out how the hell you give back to a guy like Tyler. Dylan gets down to the dregs before inspiration strikes, his thoughts snagging on Linden’s wetsuit. 

They’re close enough in size and build that it should fit, and if it doesn’t Dylan will make do because that’s what he does, because Tyler has mentioned teaching him how to surf half a dozen times without pressing.

Hoechlin never presses. 

Dylan prides himself on being a man of action, and with his mind made up, waiting seems pointless. His hip twangs when he swings his legs and pushes up out of the chair, probably a side effect of sleeping on a saggy couch rather than a bed. The patio door snicks closed behind him, shutting out the cries of the gulls, the lap of waves against the shoreline. Instead of winding back to the kitchen, he abandons his mug on the coffee table in the hopes it learns something about trying to kill him. Coffee rings are hell. 

There are three bedrooms along the hall, two tiny ones, glorified closests really, on either side of the main bathroom with Jack-and-Jill doors that will prove dangerous if Hoechlin ever lets anyone stay the night for real. Both of them are empty save a twin mattress on the floor and stacks of boxes waiting to be dealt with. Unless someone kidnapped Tyler last night, the master suite won’t be.

At the end of the hall, the door stands ajar. Sunlight slips through the crack laying a stripe of gold against the scuffed pine, and sanctity of sleep be damned, Dylan’s going to learn to surf today if it kills him. Because he can’t wear the weight of Tyler’s kindness without doing _something_ , not even if it means violating his own carefully structured code.

Too late, Dylan reconsiders. He could leave, _should_ leave probably, scrawl a note for Tyler and tuck it in between the empty beer bottles and plastic bowls crusted with Cheeto crumbles that litter the kitchen counter. Dylan’s car is in the driveway. No one would ever know. 

But he’s already in Hoechlin’s bedroom, soft light filtering through the bleached out panels hung at the windows and it really is too fucking late. Everything smells like Tyler, sandalwood soap and cinnamon and salt, and he’s sacked out with his head shoved half under one of three pillows. Sometime during the night, he kicked out of the sheet. It’s rucked down past his hips, draped like someone dressed him for a damn underwear shoot or something. Except there’s no brand name painstakingly embroidered on the band, just a school. Although they look soft, comfortable, his boxer briefs also look a couple sizes too small, black fabric worn to grey. The Sun Devil stamped on the ass has cracked and flaked away in so many places, it’s nearly unrecognizable. 

Dylan swallows and shakes himself, fingers twitching against his thighs while he fights the urge to steal a T-shirt and tug it on. It’s ridiculous. He knows it’s ridiculous. Fact. Facts don’t help him in the face of Tyler’s equally ridiculous awesomeness, because even relaxed in sleep, his back deserves a sonnet or a song or something way more eloquent than Dylan’s even capable of thinking, much less saying. And it’s not like he’s carrying some super-secret torch for one of his best friends, he just has _eyes_.

Overhead, the fan spins a lazy cycle, drafting at the curtains enough to make them move. New light skates across Tyler’s skin and he shifts, slow and easy, a stupid sated lion thing that should probably be illegal. And if Dylan can see the granules of sand caught in the curve of Tyler's spine, he’s standing too goddamn close and has been for too long without doing anything to wake Hoechlin up, which was the whole point. 

“Rise and shine,” he chirps, brighter and slightly more manic than intended. “You’re going to teach me to ride the waves today, buddy.”

Tyler stirs again, rolling onto his side, then his back, his arm flung across the mattress with complete disregard for everything ever. And this is _not_ better. The sheet clings for dear life, threaded between his calves, though most of it has slipped the bed entirely, pooling off the side like its sole purpose in life is to drive Dylan crazy. 

He gets it, okay. Hoechlin is a fucking specimen of manhood. Doesn’t matter that they’ve been wrapped for months, he’s still an athlete in a way Dylan has never really been. Tyler works at it like it means something, and while he’s softer now that may just be the fact that they stopped waxing him to death. Dylan’s fingers twitch again, tapping out a staccato rhythm against his leg, because some small part of him wants to know what that hair feels like now that it’s grown back in, whether it’s soft or wiry. And he doesn’t even have the good sense to be embarrassed about it. With Hoechlin beyond the reach of consent, doing so would most definitely be considered a bad touch, so he doesn’t.

Dylan risks a step closer, fitting his hands around the edge of the bed to shake it, and damn if Tyler’s head doesn’t loll, his fingers finding purchase alongside Dylan’s to try to still the rocking mattress. If he didn’t feel like a giant creeper before, Dylan sure as shit does now and he can’t even cobble together a reasonable explanation in his head, much less one that would make sense to Tyler. “Hoechlin,” he says, gentle but firm. “Tyler. Up and at ‘em, wolfboy, time’s a wastin’.”

In the ensuing mumble, all Dylan makes out is a plaintive, “D?” that does things to his chest he won’t talk about later, but Tyler stretches with intent this time, his eyelids twitching with the flutter of his pulse. It’s right there between his collarbones if Dylan would only look. He doesn’t.

“Yeah, Ty,” he says. “It’s me. Now come _on_. Waves and shit.”

Tyler licks his lips twice, then his mouth slides slack and Dylan tries to lean back, remove himself from the situation and Hoechlin’s house because clearly this was a very bad idea. But when he lets go of the bed to extricate himself, a hand wraps around his wrist. 

It’s not the first time, not nearly. They, and by they he means the cast, are the handsiest group of people he’s ever met. Hoechlin has touched him thousands of times, but this is different. Not just because they’re alone and half naked and he’s in Tyler’s bedroom. They lived together. That particular confluence of events was called Thursday. Or Sunday. Or hell, just—day. But because there’s a charge in the air that makes it hard to breathe, because he’s been creeping for the last five minutes, or maybe just staring, but definitely admiring more than your average heterosexual dude should. Good thing Dylan Kinseys out at like a 2.5, or this would be a completely different kind of internal monologue. 

So, yeah, maybe there is a torch of sorts, old and a little crusty, like, straight out of Indiana Jones or something, one Dylan never allowed himself to reach for. They work together and Tyler, with his easy smiles and casual, constant geniality, is incredibly hard to read when it comes to actual motive. Hoechlin charms everyone, is nice to _everyone_ and whatever signals might be there get lost in the buzzing interference that is his fucking personality. It's a quirk that had once infuriated Dylan, but he accepted long ago that’s just the way it was going to be.

Of course, that’s also before he found himself standing beside Tyler’s bed, the band of Tyler’s fingers rough and sleep warm, Tyler’s thumb stroking over his pulse point when he resettles his grip and starts to tug. Dylan tries to keep his feet, mostly because he’s not an asshole and Tyler really is out of it. In the end, he’s just enough of an asshole to let Tyler drag him down, heart kicking up into his throat when he finally falls, lungs empty and eyes open. He teeters on the edge of the bed for a tenuous span of seconds, uncertain where to put his leg that it won’t either interfere with Hoechlin’s sprawl or prematurely introduce his thigh to some of the more tender parts of anatomy he really wouldn’t mind getting familiar with once both parties are conscious. It leaves him squirming and unbalanced, his cheek pressed to Tyler’s bare shoulder and arm bent beneath him at an unnatural angle. 

“C’mon, Ty,” he grumbles, and maybe now that he’s right up in Tyler’s grill, Tyler will hear and wake up before Dylan does something he knows he shouldn’t. It will either make this better or exponentially more awkward, but at least he won’t be in it alone.

Tyler, being a contradictory bastard, only mutters under his breath and proceeds to manhandle Dylan into position. That’s how he ends up pressed against Tyler’s heat, knee somewhere in the vicinity of Tyler’s hip, head tucked into the space beneath Tyler’s chin, hand splayed against that spray of soft, dark hair he’d wanted to touch so badly. It’s not because Dylan lets it happen or because he angles himself to allow it, it’s because Tyler could bench press his car if he wanted to and Dylan would rather feel helpless to stop it than admit he’s indulging at someone else’s expense. 

But if he’s thinking it, then he has to own it, which makes his skin flash hot and cold and he tries, again, to pull back. His momma reared him right and letting himself have this just because he wants it is a level of wrong Dylan can’t abide. It works in theory. He visualizes the way he slips out, sees Tyler roll over again and drift back to sleep after he leaves. The problem with life is that imagination so rarely meets reality, there are always holes in the fabric and he sucks at execution. When Dylan lifts his leg to swing it back so he can shift his hips, Tyler’s hand catches in the bend of his knee, dragging him back. The pads of his fingers brush against the sensitive skin there and Dylan swallows hard, slamming his eyes shut to curse the irony of his existence. There’s only so much he can fucking take. Really. Like, did he murder someone in a past life? Because, really?

Dylan’s second attempt at a getaway fails even more spectacularly, and he ends up with Tyler’s arms looped around his ribcage like the guy has a condition, sleep clinging instead of walking. Dylan gives up on gentle, on subtle, on getting out of this without reawakening some of those long abandoned fantasies. He twists and pretty much shouts Tyler’s name into the shell of his ear, and he’s supposed to be disappointed when it doesn’t work but he’s not. See above, re: asshole.

“Stop,” Tyler says, no, growls. There’s no heat in it, just fondness that makes Dylan want to punch him right in the solar plexus. His breathing has shallowed out and while he hasn’t yet opened his eyes, Dylan suspects he knows exactly what he’s doing. 

Dylan pokes at his chest, instead, says, “Dick,” and digs his knuckle in between Tyler’s ribs because it would require too much effort to break the death grip and get his completely earned licks in.

Tyler laughs, quiet and content, breath hot in Dylan’s hair. “Unless you failed all four years of high school science, I think you know better.”

“What?” Dylan swears he had a witty comeback for that one, but Tyler’s hands unfurl in the small of his back, palms hot and fingertips rubbing the knobs at the base of his spine, and he can’t remember his fucking name, much less why he should be pissed at Tyler or what the hell Tyler means.

It’s obscene, how easily he gives in to it, to Tyler. The skitter-stop of his heart thunders in his ears, fast, verging on panic. He doesn’t know what this means. They haven’t talked about it. And, like, half naked cuddling is totally something you talk about.

“You’re a pain in my ass, Dylan,” Tyler murmurs. His lips are actually in Dylan’s hair now, his voice low and impossibly serious given the strangeness of the situation. “Smart as you are, you work pretty damn hard at being obtuse where it counts.” 

Dylan spins through the possible explanations for that statement and comes up empty. “Do you want me to go? I can. Because this is…” He tries to gesture, but his arm’s stuck in the circle of Tyler’s extremely intimidating biceps. “I don’t know what this is.”

Tyler heaves an exasperated sigh, like having this conversation is the absolute last thing on the planet he wants to be doing. Dylan has time enough to listen to the uptick in his heart rate and think about the frantic rush of oxygenated blood before he’s being manhandled again. Actually lifted and tossed onto the empty side of the bed like he weighs nothing, and there’s a dark, deep-seated burn that flares to life when he sets down, a knowledge he'll have to own up to later when there aren't so many other things to think about. There’s no shame in flailing, his limbs ignoring every last one of his commands as Tyler hauls him up then over, pushing him into place until he’s nothing more than a limp excuse for a little spoon and his face is full of Tyler’s scent; his sweat and cologne and his stupid cinnamon toothpaste. 

“I want you to stay, dumbass,” Tyler says, a whisper he buries against the side of Dylan’s neck, his hand skating the plane of Dylan’s chest with a reverence that defies all earthly logic. Then he shifts his hips, the weight of his thigh braced against Dylan’s hip, stuck, like he’s trying to figure out something really fucking important before he presses in, curls himself around Dylan. And Dylan heaves a shaky breath of his own because Tyler is hard, dick riding the groove between his ass cheeks when he rocks his hips. “Trust me, you have no idea.”

Dylan blinks, rolling his tongue against his teeth, and waits patiently for the other shoe to drop. Hell, he’s been waiting for the other shoe to drop since he landed _Teen Wolf_ , which is a great and awesome and an un-freaking-believable opportunity, but it is also not the sort of thing that happens to him. Ever. Because _Jesus_ , Hoechlin’s this sweet, smoldering, ridiculous Greek god of a man and people like that date starlets and marry tennis pros and shit, they don’t trick goofy, still semi-gangly people like Dylan into their beds with unspoken promises.

Unless, they do.

Tyler’s hand strays again, fingers threading through Dylan’s to still them where they’ve apparently gone spastic against his stomach, and there’s uncertainty in Tyler’s voice he’s trying to mask when he says, “Dylan?” and starts to stutter into an apology.

“Oh my god, you’re totally into me.” 

Dylan hadn’t meant to say it out loud, but he and epiphanies have a kind of hate-hate relationship where he despises them, and they embarrass the ever living hell out of him in exchange. In this particular case, he may be willing to look the other way. Tyler goes still against his back, tense but trying not to telegraph it, and it would be a crying shame to have to kick his ass for being nervous after all of this, but sometimes necessity dictates.

“Is that…” Tyler starts then stops, breathes, and starts again. “I mean, are you—“

“If you ask me whether I’m okay with that, I will be required to fricassee you, dude.”

That startles Tyler into a laugh, limbs going liquid again when he rubs his cheek against the short hair at Dylan’s nape. Feels weird. Not a bad weird, just different. Stubble has heretofore not been part of Dylan’s repertoire; the few guys he’s fooled around with were more metro than Colton and as such were allergic to facial hair. It’s kind of nice, actually. Dylan enjoys trophies and the raw places Tyler is going to scrape onto his body today will sting when he showers later, which is totally fucking fine.

“So, what was the plan, exactly?” Dylan asks, completely unable to control his smirk. “Cuddle me into compliance?”

Tyler nips at the back of his neck, his breath a hot rush that very nearly makes Dylan shudder in an unmanly fashion. Now that he understands the game, he’s more than happy to play. Even though it takes ninja skills to extract his hand, somehow Dylan manages, reaching back to hook his fingers behind Tyler’s knee this time. Instinct makes him roll his hips, hand sliding up until his nails catch against fabric and slip under. All the lean, corded muscles of Tyler’s thigh twitch and he chokes on his exhale, arms locking down until Dylan has to fight for air too. And that’s worth every second of confusion, every moment of discomfort. Because he did that.

“Plan implies premeditation,” Tyler says, lips to skin. His voice rumbles in his chest like he’s some giant, satisfied jungle cat and it turns Dylan’s smile into something more genuine. “You’re the one that opened the door, D. I just—seized opportunity.” 

Dylan snorts. "Who said I wanted to be seized?" 

"You didn't get up?" It shouldn't be a question, really, but there's an particular kind of lilt tacked on the end that forces Dylan to reconsider the 'giving Hoechlin shit' portion of today's program. Later, once they're more sure of each other and neither one of them has call to question, he'll give Tyler a hard time. Dylan understands better than most how terrifying it can be to put yourself out there, and if he were in the same position, he can't say he wouldn't do the same. 

So, yeah, he’s kind of a hypocrite. That’s nothing new.

For what it's worth, Tyler relaxes his hold, still close, still there, still a wide wall of muscle and heat at Dylan’s back, but more himself. Dylan takes it as a sign of good faith. 

"Nope," Dylan says, wriggling until he's able to plant his shoulder and shift onto his other side. Words are all well and good, but Dylan also knows Tyler. Eye contact, body language? Both important. "I didn't." 

Tyler looks different with his hair buzzed back, more—something Dylan hasn’t been able to put his finger on quite yet. Right now, he’s going with vulnerable. His lashes flutter, eyelids twitching when Dylan settles in, but he doesn’t open his eyes. Of course. No reason for his life to get easy _now_. Maybe Tyler’s waiting for the other shoe to drop too, telling himself that if he doesn’t actually look, he can pretend he’s been dreaming all along.

Which, fuck that.

When it comes to these kinds of things, the key is to not think too hard. Tyler wants him, like, for real, and Dylan can be brave enough for both of them.

Tyler startles when his lips land, just a sharp intake of breath, eyes slitted and wary, instead of flying wide. And it’s a little off center, a little awkward, the same way it is the first time Dylan has ever kissed anyone. Sort of an organized trainwreck of feelings and hope and the deep-seated desire to not _suck_. Once he realizes, once he trusts, Tyler makes up for it by kissing him back, opening like he opens to everything –easy. 

And it’s awesome. 

Dylan’s world narrows to the slick heat of Tyler’s mouth, the flick of his tongue, the feel of his hands. Somehow, they’re on his face, grounding, keeping him steady and still and this is nothing like kissing a girl, not even close. Everything’s heightened, calluses against his cheekbones and stubble grazing his chin, Tyler thorough and demanding and attentive and fucking perfect.

Breathing becomes an issue sooner than he’d like, every cell of his body aching to stay where he is, let Tyler continue to devour his mouth. Passing out seems the only alternative though, and Dylan has things to do, touch, and taste before that happens. Preferably six hours from now. Or ten. 

“Jesus.” Dylan sucks in a breath, mouth slow and swollen, tasting of Tyler. “It’s always the quiet ones.”

Tyler, honest to god, laughs, all too-white teeth and that stupid nose crinkle thing he does sometimes, and Dylan can feel the vibrations kick against his sternum. “That—may have been planned,” he says, voice catching in a way that makes that hole in Dylan's chest seize. Suddenly, there’s a leg threaded between his, a heel nudging at the back of his calf, and Dylan’s skin feels too tight, his dick taking a hell of a lot of interest in the sweet curve of skin pressed against it. Tyler’s eyes are finally open, finally focused, and they’re only for Dylan, fine lines at the corners threatening because he’s smiling like some love-struck doofus.

And what can Dylan say to that. 

So he chooses the path of least resistance. 

It’s a simple thing to spread his palm against the obscene swell of Tyler’s chest and drag it down, mapping a landscape he’s seen a million times over but never imagined he’d be allowed to touch. Maybe later, after they’ve shaved the giddy edge off this thing, Dylan will take his time, prove to Tyler that you don’t have to be quiet to know. For now, Dylan’s too hopped up on hormones, and damn if his molars don’t ache with wanting, a sudden impossible desire to swallow Tyler down. He sets his teeth against Tyler’s collarbone instead, relishing the hiss it pulls out into the air. The sound distracts him enough that Dylan does it again, sucking at the marks he’s made until they turn pink. 

Tyler will be the end of him, really he will. The throaty noises he’s making, the way he’s clutching and grabbing at Dylan’s back but otherwise letting him do whatever the hell he wants is just—

His train of thought derails mid-sentence, because the world tilts and suddenly there’s a patch of warm sheet against his back.

“You are actually impossible,” Tyler says, or, tries to say, he thinks. All Dylan hears is the thump of his own heart beating like some insane flightless bird against his ribcage. Tyler’s hands fall exactly where he wants them to, proprietary as they tug the knot out of the drawstring strung through the band of his trunks. There’s a second, a glance, a moment where Tyler falters again, just one, but whatever Ty sees in his face must be permission enough. In the next second, Dylan is blissfully unencumbered, his swim trunks sailing to an unknown corner of the bedroom.

Dylan feels like he should be self-conscious. Not every day he’s laid out naked in the bed of some ridiculously hot guy. But this ridiculously hot guy is Tyler and when Dylan says, “You too,” Tyler strips down without so much as blinking.

Doubt dies an uneventful death soon thereafter, lost to the warmth of Tyler’s calves against his thighs, hair prickling against over-sensitized skin when he rocks back onto his heels, knees planted against the bed on either side of Dylan’s hips. Dylan’s fingers itch, wanting to touch, to take Tyler apart and put him back together so he can do it again. He manages to get a hand anchored before Tyler lines them up, and _fuck_ but this is going to be over too soon.

His dick twitches, verging on painful, Tyler’s hand wrapped around them both with perfect pressure, jacking slow and purposeful. Dylan struggles for words, mouth shaping curses and pleas and Tyler’s name. All he really seems equipped to do is moan and latch onto the curve of Tyler’s knee until his knuckles throb. They’re messy with pre-come, Tyler’s hand slipping with it even as it eases the way, lets him pick up the pace. That alone gives Dylan ideas that wind the pressure at the base of his spine tighter. 

Because this is not just about now, but tomorrow, and six months down the line and Dylan’s already building a list. A _long_ list.

The stretch of Tyler’s stomach is a revelation, the bunch and tic of the muscles as he works both of them toward the brink, fighting for breath. Dylan knew, abstractly. Being up close and personal breeds a completely different kind of appreciation. He scrabbles for a hold, nails digging into Tyler's hip when the head of his cock skates past Tyler’s again. Tyler pitches forward then, rhythm failing, sharing breath that sears its way through all of Dylan’s nerve endings. Dylan grabs because he can, greedy and reckless, relishing the way Tyler’s shoulder flexes on each stroke. 

In the end, Tyler takes him apart by chanting his name. It sounds like a benediction, like Dylan is precious and worthy and wanted, like there’s nowhere Tyler would rather be. His lips catch on Dylan’s when he comes, tongue fierce and frantic, as if he’d happily eat his way inside if only Dylan would let him. And that, just the terrifying intensity of Tyler, the cut of teeth against his lower lip is all it takes to send Dylan crashing after. 

Sticky doesn’t begin to cover it, come and sweat and spit every-fucking-where, but Dylan’s also too wrung out to care. By some miracle, his arms move when he tells them to, and Tyler’s back is really as broad as it has always been, the weight of him a comfort rather than a burden.

“Does this mean it’s my turn to make a wish?” Dylan whispers, reaching up to rub Tyler’s head the way Tyler rubs his when he’s sporting the Stiles cut. There are about six thousand running jokes on set. This one belongs to them, only them.

Dylan feels Tyler smile against his shoulder, and the sea monster lurching around in his stomach settles down for a siesta. Maybe the after won’t be weird. Maybe. “Sure,” Tyler grunts. “Your wish is my command.”

“Dude, I thought you of all people knew better by now.”

Tyler pushes up onto an elbow, his face still too close to really focus on, so he’s mostly a blur of stubble and chiseled jaw and those weird not-really-green eyes of his. “Glutton for punishment. What can I say?”

“I’m the impossible one,” Dylan mutters. “Right.” He can’t help himself, hell, doesn't want to shut down the jump-cut montage of increasingly filthy images unspooling in his brain. _Damn_ , the things he’ll do to Tyler. 

“Oblivious, then. If that works better for you” Tyler shifts, grimacing at the mess between their bellies, but he doesn’t move away. However uncertain Tyler may have been in the beginning, he’s as relaxed as Dylan’s ever seen him now – kiss blushed and sated, eyes heavy-lidded. “Never thought I’d invoke the caveman protocol, but whatever works.”

“I thought you didn’t need no stinking plan.” Dylan feels the chuckle Tyler swallows, and smiles. 

“Uh yeah. About that,” Tyler says, grin going sheepish.

“I knew it! You were totally seducing me, you big faker.”

For a second, Dylan thinks Tyler might implode beneath the weight of his righteous indignation, but his expression morphs, softening to the one Dylan only ever sees out of the corner of his eye, and he wants to kiss Tyler so bad right now his jaw aches with it.

“If you had any idea, Dylan,” Tyler starts, then he sighs and thumbs at Dylan’s lower lip like he can’t figure out how to say what he wants to. His skin tastes of salt, of them, and Dylan drinks it in, tongue working against the whorls. 

And, yeah, there’s shit they should talk about, work out. How they’re going to keep it together on set. Whether they’re going to tell anyone. If there’s anything to tell. Logistics are a nightmare, though, and it’s still early.

So instead of pushing a list of unanswerable questions between them, Dylan says, “Well, now I do,” and kisses Tyler until he can’t breathe.


End file.
